Letter to the Editor: It's time for Downey to clean up the riverbed

Dear Editor:

As someone who regularly walks, jogs and bikes on the San Gabriel River Bike Trail, there is nothing more anxiety inducing than when the bike path goes underneath the narrow, unlit 5 Freeway and also under the Telegraph Road overpass.

Both sections are filled to the brim with homeless tents and loose dogs. The pavement under the 5 Freeway is full of potholes and bumps, forcing cyclists to slow down dramatically in a dangerous area. They also scatter their junk all across the bike lanes. Not to mention all the stolen motorcycles, mopeds and scooters with fake paper plates or no plates at all.

The Telegraph section of the bike path is just as bad. There is literally active drug dealing (likely fentanyl) going on there. There’s swaths of burned trash everywhere. Loose dogs roaming around in the bike lanes.

The problem is that nobody wants to take ownership and responsibility of those sections of the San Gabriel River.

The LA County Sheriff’s says it’s not their jurisdiction and says to refer to Downey or Santa Fe Springs. Downey PD says it’s Santa Fe Spring’s jurisdiction. And Whittier Police, who handles police services in Santa Fe Springs, says it’s Downey’s problem.

This is exactly why they’ve been able to get away with living there for so long, because neither Downey or Santa Fe Springs wants to take responsibility for that area. While the two cities are fighting over whose problem it is, the drug dealers stay winning and cyclists and joggers who want to enjoy the trail are losing.

I call on Downey officials to please clean up this area and remove the homeless tents and expel the drug dealers. Even if the area is not technically within city limits. It’s not like Santa Fe Springs is going to do anything about it anyway.

Rob Mendoza
Downey